Plan: 30 Days of Pride

Hi. So, in my attempt to do something that is close to my heart and identity, I've decided on doing this. During Pride Month this June, I intend--as someone who fully realised their bisexuality within the last year--to do one post a day on my socials highlighting an author/creative that falls on the LGBTQIA+ spectrum. One per day, for thirty days, using the hashtag #30DaysOfPride. Now, this isn't a small task, and it's also open to being royally messed up if I just set about it randomly, so I'm setting up a few ground rules.

Rule 1: The creatives in question need to be confirmed either through their own words/actions, or personal anecdotes, to be on the rainbow spectrum. That means some figures with question marks over their head, such as T. H. White, will not be counted. There may be some compelling evidence surrounding these people, but there's no confirmation about it and it's still a debated topic. That also rules out Shakespeare, since we really can't be sure about him either. See this video from J. Draper on that subject, which I heartily agree with. It similarly rules out straight creators who wrote LGBTQI+ characters. I may well miss some creatives that could have been better included on the list, and if so I apologise.

Rule 2: I'm going to try and provide a mixture of authors/creatives from across time periods. It would be surprisingly easy to go for a lot of classic and mostly now-dead creatives such as Noel Coward, but that would be too easy. Also it would be doing a disservice to multiple current authors. I also hope to get a descent amount of BIPOC creators into it, so it can be shown it's not just whites who fall along the spectrum.

Rule 3: They must have created some kind of original story in a form that is a narrative with words. This can be a graphic novel, a book or short stories, plays, or a video game. It doesn't matter the genre, but it must be a written narrative. There are a number of famous LGBTQIA+ artists, actors, singers, and similar. But this quest is for writers, the ones who can move with words. This isn't to devalue these others' work, but only to highlight creatives of narrative-based fiction. This also partly rules out non-fiction.

At the end of the 30 days, which is a Sunday and thus my usual blog posting time, I'll be bringing together all the creatives mentioned, and including a section of honourable mentions. The honourable mentions are to help incorporate some which I really wanted to include, but don't quite fit in with what I want to attempt with this. I don't know whether this will work out, but I really want it to be...something. An attempt by me to highlight a group that for a very long time has needed to work either in secret or under a veil of obscurity. And now they--we--are coming into the light.

Here's to Pride Month.